| Re: Shalidar
I've always found that the mark of a good bad guy is when I secretly end up cheering for them. Oh yes, most of me wants to see them brought to justice and their schemes foiled, but if there's a tiny little perverse bit of me that kinda hopes the evil dude wins and is a little sad when they bite the inevitable dust, then that bad guy really sticks in my mind. So congratulations Mark, because that evil little bit of my soul did give a cackle when Shalidar got away at the end of Imperial Spy!
The great thing about the way you've written him is that he comes across as a competent bad guy who actually knows what he's doing and is genuinely the best at what he does. So often, writers create bad guys who are actually rather simple to overcome, or easily outwitted, but this assassin comes across as being very skilful, very clever and therefore genuinely dangerous. The fact that he outwits Femke (who also comes across as smart and skilled in tradecraft) and kills Danar adds to his sense of menace very well.
Nice one Mark! |